


Tomorrow I’ll keep a beat, and repeat yesterday’s dance

by meanpancake, naeviastark



Series: Musketeers' Disability Fest [1]
Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: Blind Character, Canon Era, Disability Fest, Disabled Character, Disabled Character of Color, M/M, No Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-02
Updated: 2015-07-02
Packaged: 2018-04-07 09:21:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4257954
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meanpancake/pseuds/meanpancake, https://archiveofourown.org/users/naeviastark/pseuds/naeviastark
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Porthos is blinded during a mission, but it's not the first time he plays this game.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tomorrow I’ll keep a beat, and repeat yesterday’s dance

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Fairly Local by Twenty One Pilots.
> 
> I saw that yesterday started the disability fest (you can visit the tumblr page with the disabilityfest url for more info!) and after reading an ableist fic about Porthos this morning I wanted to write something happy, especially since Porthos doesn't get much love in the fandom ;) Enjoy it!
> 
> I am not blind so call me out if anything is wrong.

Porthos was 8 years old the first time he closed his eyes and welcomed the darkness. It had been his birthday the day before, or at least the day he chose to celebrate it, so Charon had said he had to iniciate himself now that he was a big boy. 

The Iniciation was an old tradition for the kids at the court of miracles. Only a few could pass the test, and both of his friends had been able to do it, so he felt even more pressed than the rest of the kids to win the challenge.

“It’s easy,” Charon had said that morning “you just close your eyes, and steal from a rich person.”

Of course he made it sound easier than what it actually was but Flea was there too, and she had been 8 years old for a few months now, so she knew the tricks and secretly shared them with him.

“You can’t trust your sight, so you have to trust your other feelings.” she had said and closed her eyes on the street outside their rooms to show him an example “Like this.”

Her little hand pointed at the cart that sold old rotted food, the scraps that people outside the court didn’t consider food. “That’s where the cart is” she said and moving her hand to the right she pointed at a house “and that’s where the house of the old lady is, she is in the inside, probably sleeping.”

Porthos had huffed “The cart is there everyday, and the old lady goes back inside everyday at the same hour, you are tricking me”

Little Flea had punched him on the arm before opening her eyes, and the first thing she saw was a pouting Porthos rubbing at his arm “I knew the cart was there because it smells bad, and I knew the lady was inside because I could hear her cat scratching the door so she would let it in” 

She then had put her hand on top of Porthos eyes and said ‘feel’ and it was all the practice Porthos needed.

Later that day, he was standing in an alley in one of the city most crowded streets, where the market was. His eyes were closed and he was trying to concentrate, knowing Charon would be watching his every move from behind. 

There was a lot of chattering that drowned the other noises, and it was hard at first but then he started to hear it, the distinct sound of horses.

Porthos knew a lot of horses together meant someone rich was close. Soon enough there were noises of people moving around to let the horses pass by. He started walking towards the sound, a little insecure in his step and when the noise started coming from next to him he stilled himself and took a big breath. 

The next step was touching. He easily got inside the crowd, touching people’s legs and dresses as he went by. There was a lot of murmuring about who the person could possibly be, and nobody was paying attention to the kids running around. Porthos could hear them giggling and knew they were hiding, and people were probably mistaking him with one of the players.

He came to a halt behind two women talking. One of them smelled like food, she either was a mother or a cook, and he could also smell the fresh food in her basket. Reaching a hand tentatively he managed to find the basket and slipped his hand inside. His hand closed around what he guessed was a tomato.

He easily slipped it out and opened his eyes. The world had a grey tint, the one that comes with closing your eyes for a long time against the sun and everything looked surreal. He looked down at his hand and grinned at the red not-rotted tomato in it. He was a big boy now.

*

Porthos felt the unexpected blow to his head and the grin he was sporting changed into a frown as he fell on his knees. There was no time to duel on it as he closed his eyes to stop the world from spinning around and slipped a knive on the leg of his opponent who fell with a cry to the floor. Porthos turned around, neither too fast, to not vomit, or to slow, because he could be stabbed.

Just in time he could hear a growl of anger and the rustling of an arm moving. Porthos grabbed said arm to stop it and put his own knife in the man’s throat. Hot liquid touched his hand and he grinned as he heard the gagging noises.

The sounds of the fight were getting slim and he guessed his brothers could take care of the rest of the men.

They had been ambushed, which wasn’t uncommon, but it was uncommon to be surprised from behind by a tiny fast man, he would give him the credit, and he was exhausted.

He crowled to where the trees were, listening to the sound of the wind ruffling the leaves and sat with his back against the tree, careful to not lean his head against it. 

A few minutes later he felt Aramis kneeling at his side and moving his head to the side “That looks bad” he said and Porthos didn’t know if he was surprised or not. On one side he was exhausted, which was strange, but in the other, he could barely feel the pain. p>

“Little bastard” he said and Aramis chuckled.

“He was indeed a small man, I’m not sure where he took the courage from to engage with you” Aramis said.

Clear, determined and hard steps got closer and Porthos wasn’t surprised when he heard Athos ask “Everything okay?” but he was indeed surprised when he opened his eyes to look at his lover but the darkness remained. He blinked in confusion and looked up to where he knew Athos’ face should have been.

“Aramis” he heard Athos saying after a few seconds and Aramis hummed, busy checking the wound on his head.

“Aramis” Athos repeated more firmly and he could feel Aramis turning around. The air was tense.

He could feel the two pairs of eyes on him and turned to watch Aramis when he called his name. But Aramis’ form wasn’t there. Only his smell and his warmth that Porthos was so used to.

“What’s happening” they both said at the same time as Athos moved closer and kneeled on his other side, resting a hand on his knee.

“You are acting weird” Aramis said with clear worry in his voice.

Porthos was silent, he knew it just worried his brothers more, but he wasn’t sure how to deliver the news to people that hadn’t been born around blind elders. In the court, there were a lot of blind people, and it wasn’t an issue. In the other places, it wasn’t like that.

With all the confident he could master to drown the fear of his brothers’s pity he said “Everything is black”

Aramis made a confused sound and Athos stayed silent. “What do you mean?”

He chuckled even if it wasn’t meant to be funny “I can’t see, that’s what I mean”

He felt more than he heard Aramis hand come up and before he could wave it in front of his face he grabbed it firmly and growled “I know what you are trying to do, don’t” he warned.

Aramis let his hand fall to his side. And there was a silence, cut down but Athos saying “You don’t look blind.”

Porthos growled again. “Blind people don’t look a certain way.”

Another silence. 

“You are too calm, ” Aramis pointed out “it must be the shock.”

His voice was still worried, like he didn’t know what to do. He saved the two of them by saying “We have to go back to the Garrison” which put the other two in the move.

*

It was a few months after that things had almost gone back to normalcy. After his brothers inicial fears, and hopes that he would be cured in the future had dissapeared, Porthos felt like he could finally breath again near them.

Now, 8 months after the accident, Aramis kept challenging him everyday to test what he called his Super Powers.

He did miss the sight of his brothers' faces when he knew they were smiling, like in the moment. 

Right now Aramis had challenged him to shoot a melon he was holding over his head. It wasn’t the hardest challenge he had done so far, but it wasn’t the easiest either, with Aramis so far away. 

But it was Aramis, and they had done this game a lot of times before, so Porthos knew exactly where to point his pistol at, but he made a show of moving it around and thinking, just to impress their new friend.

D’Artagnan was behind him with Athos and even if he could perfectly hear them anyway, -d’Artagnan was still not used to the fact that Porthos could hear almost everything- they were whispering.

“But he is blind!” it was d’Artagnan’s worried answer to something Athos had said.

Porthos could feel Athos glaring at the youngest on his behalf. “He knows what he is doing, he isn’t a brute” was Athos cutting reply. p>

Porthos grinned and wished he could see his lover’s face just to mock him.

He drowned the rest of their conversation and concentrated in Aramis’ voice, who was pretending to pray for his life, which was part of the trick he and Porthos had practiced several times before, and that Aramis was very proud of for suggesting. If Porthos could hear his voice he would know where he was.

His fingers triggered the bullet, and he could hear d’Artagnan’s shout being a mix of worry and admiration and Aramis’ laugh. He felt both of them coming closer and grinned at them, while Aramis hugged him and d’Artagnan praised him. 

He turned around to watch the spot where Athos had been before and Heard him chuckle and come closer to put a hand on his shoulder “Amazing” he said and even if his voice was meant to sound deadpan Porthos could hear the affection behind it and grinned at him.

Life as a musketeer had turned out better than he had ever expected, and living at the court of miracles had saved his life, he was going to have to visit his old siblings one of these days, to share the good news with them.


End file.
